I am interested in launching a R/C plane into space with a weather balloon. The plane would hang from the weather balloon and get launched into space vertically. When the balloon reaches 100,000 ft the balloon usually pops therefore setting the glider free to glide back to home.
My question is would the best long range FPV systems be able to aid in my project? Anyone have any ideas?

http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1337165

Holy cow that was fast! Thanks so much!

That's cool

I know I want to build one for sure!

Originally Posted by woreoutpilot

I know I want to build one for sure!

Today you'll sleep, and tommorow when you wake up that idea will already be gone

Vaz.

Who cares about being the first one to do it?

I know I don't... I just want to try it a few times.

Just curious but I would think the wings would be completely ineffective until you got back down to a level where the air was thick enough.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Excelsior

I remember reading somewhere the guy saying it was eerily quiet and not feeling any wind despite reaching nearly 1000 Kph at one stage

Just remembered this article from last year.

http://www.metro.co.uk/news/818988-a...sing-a-balloon

Nick

Originally Posted by nick_75au

Just curious but I would think the wings would be completely ineffective until you got back down to a level where the air was thick enough.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Excelsior

I remember reading somewhere the guy saying it was eerily quiet and not feeling any wind despite reaching nearly 1000 Kph at one stage

Just remembered this article from last year.

http://www.metro.co.uk/news/818988-a...sing-a-balloon

Nick

U2 and SR71 fly at that altitude, and the wings are affective.

Originally Posted by m_beeson

U2 and SR71 fly at that altitude, and the wings are affective.

The U2 cruised at 70k feet, not 100k feet.
It was forced to fly near its maximum airspeed to stay up there, which at that altitude is
only 10 knots above its stall speed. It was constantly riding a very fine line between
going too fast and ripping the wings off, and stalling and simply falling out of the sky.

The SR-71's two engines generated over 64 thousand pounds of thrust, and cruising
at Mach 3ish it could overcome the low air density and very high stall speed at
80-100k feet.

An R/C aircraft dropped from 100k feet, won't even know which direction to
point into the wind for 30-40k feet of free fall and likely wouldn't actually be
able to make any meaningful direction changes until it drops below about 50k feet.
Neither is really a big deal though. As long as you don't over control it too early,
a flying wing with big winglets will naturally point its nose down when it can. It may
be falling at several hundred mph, but air pressure will only generate airspeed equivalent
of 150-200mph before drag builds enough to start slowing down again. Building
foamie airframes that can take that is not a huge challenge.

The bigger challenges are temperature regulation, and maintaining control
and video at the extreme ranges that the plane is likely to blow downwind
with the balloon during ascent. If you ignore those and simply autopilot home,
then I don't much see the point. There's already a company doing
that with an autonomous model aircraft.

ian